26 August 2013

TV program exposes Australia-PNG aid corruption link

AUSTRALIAN AID IS BEING LOST to corruption, with an estimated $1.7 million being stolen from Papua New Guinea's budget annually.

The stolen money is then brought to Australia to be hidden in our banks and the Queensland property market.

Around 59 people have already been charged with corruption offences in PNG, and it is alleged much of their illegally obtained money is spent in Cairns.

Professor Jason Sharman, deputy director of the Centre for Governance and Public Policy at Griffith University, is a renowned expert on money laundering.

Professor Sharman, along with Sam Koim, head of PNG's Anti-Corruption Task Force, are on a mission to lift the lid on billions of dollars of dirty money leaving PNG to be laundered in Australia.

"Corrupt politicians and senior officials are buying houses and gambling. Obviously they need bank accounts to do so, and setting their families up here (in Australia) as well," Professor Sharman said.

"Most of Australia's aid program is effectively wasted."

Mr Koim says they have a number of prominent politicians and businessmen on their radar.

"Almost half of the budget is being stolen. That is how big the problem is," Mr Koim said.

"They see Australia as the Cayman Islands. They see that it is the safest place where they can bring their stolen money from PNG."

There are more than 100 homes in Cairns that belong to Papua New Guineans, a similar number in Brisbane. They inhabit some of the nicest suburbs, and include the prominent PNG politicians and officials.

Comments

You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

I think Sam Koim is a very brave man. I notice that he has armed full-time bodyguards and I pray that he and his family will be kept safe during this time when corruption is being exposed.

A lot of this "corruption" took place when government departments took over the handling of large sums of money and did not follow careful accounting practices.

Accounting protocols were not followed - tenders were not called for, jobs were given to wantoks etc, etc.

I notice that Sam Koim is speaking to the accountants and auditors of PNG and warning them to be transparent in their accounting methods.

There are probably people being elected to parliament who have little understanding of correct accounting methods and who think they have the power to over-rule long held financial regulations and methods which have been put in place to stop corruption in government departments.

They are a nightmare for the people trying to run government departments and have caused much heart ache in the past.

It is up to the Minister of Treasury and Finance, Don Polye, and people working in his department, such as Simon Tosali, Steven Gibson and Betty Palaso, etc, to see that better accounting structures are in place to see that money doesn't just "disappear" in the future.

Well, it's nearly 24 hours after that pesky reporter asked KRudd why the misappropriated aid monies were not being repatriated to PNG.
Has anyone heard a response generated to answer that lingering question?